Acer frustrated by Microsoft's 'troublesome' hardware restrictions

Microsoft's insistence on a tightly restricted hardware spec for the forthcoming Windows 8 tablet OS is already proving a major frustration for at least one of its OEM partners.

Windows 8 is expected to be shown off in detail for the first time this week, but Acer feels Microsoft is being far too rigid in its hardware requirements.

The next-gen desktop and tablet OS seems set to follow in the footsteps of Windows Phone 7, which tightly restricts the components manufacturers can work with so Microsoft can deliver more device-specific features.

But Acer, the third biggest PC maker in the world, says the restrictions are giving it headaches. “They’re really controlling the whole thing, the whole process,” Acer boss JT Wang said at the Computex trade show in Taipei yesterday. Chip suppliers and PC makers “all feel it’s very troublesome”.

With Apple having had the tablet market all its own way so far, and Android making serious moves of its own into tablet-land, the pressure is very much on Microsoft to get a tablet-friendly OS onto the shelves.

Yeah, well... Acer - who used buttersoft and honey-sticky plastic screens on their top Android devices when pretty much every other manufacturer had switched to glass of some sort. Whose first beTouch had the slowwwwwwwwest processor ever.
Acer make good budgety laptops. No one forces them to make a win8 tablet